I Need Help With My Pup

Lola is now 6 months old and my father is tsarting to say he doesn't want her anymore. She digs holes non stop in the backyard and rips the branches off the cedar trees in the backyard. We take her to the tree when she does it and reprimand her, but she just doesn't stop. I don't know what to do we have had dogs in the past but none have ever done this, or have been so difficult to train. I don't want to give her up, I will move out before giving her up, but I need to know if there is something we are doing wrong or something that should be done differently? Or other ways to try to get her to stop.

Please can someone help?

I see in one of your previous threads when you posted some pictures of her (she's lovely ), you say that's she's a golden retriever x German shepherd/hound cross. So a fairly big dog.

At 6 months old, she's definitely still a pup and pups dig and chew. That's the nature of being a pup (I'm afraid)
So she's really not going to stop digging any time soon - reprimanding or not.

Is she getting plenty of exercise? Not just access to the garden - but is she being stimulated? Boredom can increase chewing and digging.

But what I would suggest in terms of general obedience, is to start taking her to training classes. You're going to need to do that anyway due to her breed and size. Though training classes benefit just about any dog anyway.

Yeah i agree with Bloo, digging and chewing things is just normal puppy behavior. Just be patient with her- if you train her carefully and do more with her, she'll grow out of it eventually.

Puppys of any sort of breed will always have bags of energy- i remember when i was a kid living on my mums farm my brother and i had a black labrador puppy each and we took them for 2-4 hour or more walks every day and they still had bags of energy even after that. Even at 5 years old, they still had their endless puppy energy. So you need to do something about it as otherwise as unless you start taking the puppy for very long walks and runs, playing with it doing games and stuff to keep the puppy mentally occupied etc, it'll just do more destructive things like chewing and digging up stuff because it has nothing else better to do. The more you exercise it and do things with it, the less energy it'll have at the end of the day to do things which annoy your dad .
Plus its good to have you and dog time for you to bond with each other more, perhaps you could encourage your dad to come out for walks with the puppy with you too? Dogs make great family animals, its good if you all do things together as much as posible. Puppys are like in children some respects though, they're very attention demanding and need to always have things to occupy them everyday.
If your garden is big enough, why don't you create a pen for the dog outdoors in the garden so at least for now, when its out and about in the garden its destructive behavior can be confined to a particular area instead of tearing up the whole garden?
What sorts of games and things do you currently play with the puppy? How often are you taking her out for walks and how long on average currently? How long is she spending out on her own in the garden?

yep agree with others, pups are like very naughty children most of the time , they get better,they chew because of their new teeth and there naughty because their bored. mine didn`t stop chewing till it was 1 1/2 and even now if she doesn`t get attention and feels ignored will chew something.
The first year we had our dog she chewed
3 mobile phones
2 of daughters dolls
mp3 player
playstation game pad and 2 ps2 microphones
numerous shoes (why do they only like your best ones lol) and lots of toilet rolls that she took off the holders and much more
We used to walk her 3x a day to wear her out, it helped alot
Good luck with your pup
Angel

Thanks for your advice everyone! I do take her for long walks to the park across the street. We don't have a huge backyard but it is large enough and she plays with her toys and zips back and forth outside, I play with her outside in the backyard as well as in the house. She is very large for her age - 60lbs so it is a little hard when she jumps round as she knocks me over. But she is learning very well with keeping down. I suppose the reason my father is getting bothered is we are more used to having a quiet 13 year old dog (who had to be put down last october). We got him as a pup and he was very easy outside - he didn't like to get his feet wet or dirty lol so we never had problems with him digging etc.

I keep reminding my father that she is only a puppy, albeit a large one, and that she is learning. I will look into obiedience classes, hopefully they have some in the town I live in. The one thing I heard about those classes though, is that the dog really will only listen to the person who takes it. Is this true? I know that is what happened to my cousin's rottweiller, it would only listen to my uncle, no one could keep the dog under control. It attacked me. And no one could get him off me because my uncle wasnt there and he wouldn't listen to my aunt.

I will take a look into it though, thanks!

l.michelle said:

The one thing I heard about those classes though, is that the dog really will only listen to the person who takes it. Is this true? I know that is what happened to my cousin's rottweiller, it would only listen to my uncle, no one could keep the dog under control. It attacked me.

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No, that is definitely not true. And in my opinion bad training. Or rather lack of proper training.
I did obedience training with Dobermann's for years. Good (proper) training will not allow for that.
Besides, otherwise those "schools" where you send your dog off to and get it back a few months later - fully trained - couldn't survive.
But it cannot be denied that a stronger bond forms with the handler/trainer and the dog than just a random stranger dishing out commands.
And ultimately the command I gave my own dog, always overruled that of a stranger or even family member. But if I kept quiet and one of them gave the dog a command, it would obey without question.

I started training with my first Dobermann when I was 8 years old - so you're never too young or too old to start classes!

I recommend puppy school. We took my staffy to puppy school and she is SO well behaved. My poodle did not go to puppy school and he is so naughty its not funny.

They are both 2.5yrs old now (got staffy bout 1 month b4 poodle).

As for the digging, fill the holes with their poo and they wont touch it again.

Hope your dad doesnt give up on her. He needs to understand she could be doing this behavour for like 3 yrs (not as bad behaviour but still naughty things).

Thanks for the replies. I will try the hole thing. I am also going to phone the vet to see if there is something I can spray at the tree to deter her

She wont quit doing a thing if its rewarding, ie its fun.

Currently, digging holes and ripping up the tree is fun, so she does it.

Dogs are like small children, they dont know a thing is wrong - unlike small children you CANNOT explain that something is wrong, you can only distract her and provide something else.

If you dont catch her IN THE ACT of doing something you dont want, there is absolutely no earthly point in taking her to the tree or the hole and telling her off. She will not understand no matter what her body language tells you. If she looks 'guilty' i can assure you, she isnt. Dogs dont feel guilt. What she WILL be doing if she ever does the 'guilty' look, is attempting to appease you as you are clearly upset with her. She doesnt know WHY though and never will.

Long walks are not enough for a pup (in fact for a pup destined to be a big dog you may be damaging joints that are still forming, no more than 5mins per month of age - for a six month old dog thats 30 mins a day of 'official' exercise ie walks).

Instead what NEEDS to be kept occupied is their minds. She WILL stop digging holes and wrecking trees IF you give her something better to do.

Spend time training, playing games, just time with her - dont give her access to the things she can get wrong, ie the tree.

Puppies dont do these things to annoy us, puppies chew and dig and rip up stuff because they NEED to. So give her things seh CAN rip up, give her big raw meaty bones so she has something to chew, make her a sand pit and hide her toys in it so she has somwhere shes allowed to dig.

Shes not a bad dog, shes a bored self employed dog!

Well of course reprimanding a dog after the fact won't work lol, by the time they finish what they have done they have pretty well forgotten. If we catch her in the act then we reprimand her. reprimand sounds bad, but we don't hit her, we have never hit any dog. She does have a lot of things to occupy her mind, both outside the house (which she is wonderful in, never had any problem with her chewing furniture or ripping things apart) and outside she has dozxens of toys, one of her favourites is a weird looking rubber ball type thing on a rope, which she holds by the rope part and swings it around and into the air. She does have bones, but rawhide bones, We have never given her animal bones before, unless it is a rib bone that has been cooked and then we just hold it while she chews the meat off. I think we are a little paranoid about if the bone were to break and she swallowed sharp pieces, we don't give the dogs real bones.

I will try the sandhole thing in the summer (it is winter and snowy here now) My mother talked to the vet yesterday and they said they will think of something to do and let us know.

She gains access to the tree because she loves playing in the backyard. We take her for nice walks, the vet told us she is getting a little chunky because she was still on puppy food (which we are gradually changing to adult food because of her weight) and so he told us that it was good she get exercise.

One thing I've noticed from your posts is that most of the things she's doing to occupy herself are not involving you/your family by the sounds of things. You say she plays with her toys, not that you play together?

Now is a crucial time for her to be learning manners and "rules" - telling her off in any way when she's not being supervised or stimulated is not going to work (I'm a bit confused by your comments on this as in your first post, you say you "take her back" to the tree to reprimand her, then say you only reprimand her while shes doing it, which contradicts what you first said).

She needs interactive play and training (clicker training is excellent) to keep her mind occupied as well as her body - she won't occupy herself given a toy to do her own thing with. A dog of her size, breed/s and age should be getting a lot of interactive time, playing together, training, etc. She is not going to change as long as she has her toys outside and is left to occupy herself with them - the tree and digging are always going to be more exciting and enticing. I do sympathise as we learnt this the hard way with Dharma when she uprooted our Weeping Willow tree.

She needs for access to the tree to be removed unless she's supervised, and for other more exciting things to sway her from digging to more acceptable behaviour.

I would go with everything Ems (Canis Equus) has recommended. I would also get her into puppy classes/clicker training classes with a trainer that only uses positive methods.

Just a 2nd thought here. If she's on puppy food, you might want to check to protein level. For some reason many dog food comapnies think large breed puppies need more protein, when in fact studies show the opposite, that they need lower protein (eg. adult formula) food to prevent them growing too fast and putting too much weight on their forming bones. Dharma (Bullmastiff) was on adult food from 5 months old with a protein content of no more than 22% (dry food). She now has the best joints the vet has ever seen on a BM, and it helped with her hyperactivity too.

Yeah you should definately give her as much exercise as possible as she'll grow unfit and/or overweight otherwise (like you said, puppy food is very energy intensive stuff to help them grow, if she isn't burning that energy off though she'll grow fat and unfit).
You needn't worry about bones- as long as it isn't poultry/bird bones, its fine. Its things like chicken and pheasant bones which splinter a lot, bones like cow and sheep bones should be absolutely fine . Plus its important that she gets lot of stuff she can chew on, bones are good and natural for this, letting her chew on bones will help incourage good healthy teeth growth and help prevent them rotting .

Playing games with her is also good as dogs are very intelligent animals and the vast amount of breeds we know today were originally bred as working dogs of some sort (like sheep dogs, cattle dogs, gun/retriever dogs, hunting dogs in general, guard dogs etc) and the jobs they were originally bred for required them to use their brains a lot etc.
Keep in mind that she is a dog, not a human child, and thus you should treat her like a dog (that doesn't mean you should treat her badly though of course) but you need to be the dominant one in your partnership and put your foot down always when she is doing bad behavior- its pointless if only sometimes you tell her off for doing something bad, but other times you ignore it or even be very friendly over the same action, as it gives the dog mixed signals as to what you are trying to get across to it. Also be friendly and congratulating when she is good (you need to strict when she's bad just as much as you need to be friendly and loving when she's good- only when you are doing both of these, can you properly start to get her to understand what things you are trying to get across to her). Once you have this established, you need to do as much as posible together- here's some games i used to play with my dog when i was younger;

a. Fetch- classic game. The fetch item can be anything from a stick, ball, toy etc- its a good bonding game too. Teach the dog to go to the item after throwing it and bring it back to you; then repeat this many times .
b. Obedience games like Hide and Seek: teach the dog to sit on comand, and then go hide somewhere and once you are hidden, call the dog and see if it can find you. The best way to teach your dog how to do this is to start off by getting it to sit in a place until you call it to you, and then teech the dog to came to you when you call it. The further away you can go away from the dog while it is sitting the better, but it can take some time to teach dogs these things- but just be patient with it. Whenever the dog does exactly the right thing, be friendly and treat it with a dog biscut or something, but never do this unless it is doing exactly the right thing.
c. Smell games- let the dog sniff an object then hide it under one of many plasic containers turned upside down. Switch the containers around loadsa times and see if the dog can find the object by smelling it. There are loads of variations of games like this you can do with your dog .

There are loadsa games and tricks you can play and teach your dog to do, these are just a couple of them, and its good for not just the dog but you too .
Me and my brother used to play Hide and Seek games an aweful lot with our dog when we were kids because we lived on such a large farm, we figured if either of us got hurt like broke a leg and we were all alone with no one to call for help and were stuck in some feild in the middle of nowhere, we could teach the dog to find us and then go for help- it really worked too and the dog really enjoyed learning such things too .

I love playing games with her, I don't think she understands yet the whole idea of bringing back the ball though lol she likes to be chased aruond for it. We do play hide and seek, my last dog we trained to play red light green light. He was a smart dog

I guess it has just been so long since we have had a puppy (13 years) that it is a process of us learnign everything all over again lol Thanks for your advice!!

Sorry - as Kathy highlighted, you said you 'take her back to teh tree' suggesting shes left the tree. If that is the case then no, reprimanding in any way isnt going to work.

Whats MORE important i think though, is if you DONT replace that behaviour with something else, you can reprimand and distract and say NO till you are blue in the face. If shes getting a kick out of doing it and you DONT find her something as good but more acceptable to you to do, she WILL keep on doing it.

Tokis- OVER exercising an overweight young pup is highly likely to result in a crippled adult. Dogs dont finish physically growing and maturing till two years old or even older in larger breeds. Enforced exercise such as loads of on lead walks, or hectic play with other dogs, chasing balls etc, running up and down steps, WILL damage joints seriously - this can cause hip dysplasia, cruciate ligament injuries and many other things, notably all of which will give you a seriously crippled dog and HUGE vet bills to repair the damage (say £2k for cruciate ligament op on both legs in a medium sized dog).

OP - get your dog on an adult food, feed less of it if your dog carries on getting fat. SPend time playing and little walks for socialisation, and LOTS AND LOTS of time training, clicker training, both the important stuff, ie sit down wait stay retrieve heel leave, and the fun things 'shut the door', 'find the ball/rope/kong/remote control/car keys', 'put away your toys' 'high five', roll over, etc.

A puppy with a stimulated and thus knackered MIND will be a nice well behaved pup.

A pup with a bored mind and painful joints from overexercise will be an absolute nightmare.


On more thing since Tokis brought it up.

There is NO need to 'dominate' your dog. Have a think about this one. What are dominating people like, they are overbearing, they are bossy and mean, they throw their weight about to prove a point. In short, they are generally people you DONT like and have very little interest in working for or pleasing unless you must do so due to fear of what they will do if you dont.

You should NEVER dominate your dog. If you do, you foster a very 'me versus you' relationship, and if you think, ANY relationship, be it human to human, dog to human, dog to dog, conducted like that, is going to be a constant battle - this applies whether you use physical or even aggressive behaviour or just psychological methods. If your relationship with anyone is about winning and losing, its not going to be fulfilling in the long run!

Thats NOT to say you should let your dog do exactly as he or she pleases, far from it.

Instead of the 'me v. you' thing, think of it as 'me AND you', you should be a team.

Dogs like and positively NEED boundaries and consistant rules. Without them dogs have to decide for themselve what to do and they frequently choose things humans dont appreciate - like digging holes and ripping up trees.

If you forget dominating your dog, and spend time rewarding him for the things you DO want, replacing the things you dont want with things you do want, seeking ways to remove the reward for doing the things you dont want. If you constantly reinforce the message that X wont be rewarded but Y WILL BE, you will have a dog who not only behaves well, but trusts you, WANTS to work for you and please you and respects you.

Surely thats better than a dog who behaves because he is fearful?

Regarding dominating your dog, I don't think she meant to be a horrible person, ut let the dog know that you are to be obeyed. With my last dog we had problems with him a bit because he was a lot larger than me (i am very petite) and he would push me out of the way and generally be mean to me (when i was a little younger) the vet told us that he thought he was above me in rank in the family and therefore wouldn't listen to me, and would push me around, which is not right, so I was told to be firm with him, and eventually he came around.

Regarding the walks, you make it sound like we take her for miles on end per day, this isn't the case, everynight I walk her to the mail box and back which is not a far far distance, but it is good for some time out of the house and backyard, we usually take a short detour in the park then home, about 20 minutes. On the weekends my father takes her to the park across the road and plays ball with her, or she sees her sheep dog friend and has a run around with her. Those walks are usually about 45 minutes, we don't do anything strenuous with her, she enjoys playing. We have had dogs with hip problems when they were older and we know not to push it. SHe doesn't run up and down stairs everyday, she mainly stays on the main floor of the house and follows upstairs to go to bed.

She is gradually getting on adult dog food, you can't just suddenly change from puppy to adult food so we are gradually getting her into the adult food. She is chunky from the puppy food, so, like the vet told us, we are keeping her fit.

I don't know if she is necessarily bored, she has tonnes of toys to play with, we play her in and outside the house. She likes to sit in the morning on the ottoman in the front window and looks outside



We are consistent with her, she is being trained, like all our dogs she knows not to come into the kitchen while we are eating at the table, just like all the others she quietly sits or lays down at the door to the kitchen. We aren't hard on her, but we do teach her these things.